


Training Grounds

by lunicole



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/F, Jealousy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-28
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-06-04 23:57:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6681103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunicole/pseuds/lunicole
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It starts with a mistake, it really does. Phasma ends up saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, as it often happens when dealing with Kylo Ren’s mood swings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Target Practice

It starts with a mistake, it really does. Phasma ends up saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, as it often happens when dealing with Kylo Ren’s mood swings.The knight has taken a shine, Phasma has come to learn, to destroying the more expendable material that are training recruits on board. It’s an interesting sight to watch her crush them, her black robes and masked head against the crisp white colour of the stormtroopers uniforms. Her body is shapeless under the black cloth, giving her a bulky, sexless appearance that is only accentuated by the heavy helmet she wears at all time.

 

Kylo Ren is tall and powerful, her brute strength enough to deliver a serious beating to most of her adversaries. There’s something especially vicious about how she goes about fighting. While most of the rookies who bend easily to her will go mostly unscathed, only earning themselves a few bruises when she decides she’s done with them, the ones who do give as good as they can are submitted to her full fury.

 

It’s an interesting sight to watch her fight, but Phasma can’t help but to feel uneasy about the way Hux stops to catch a look at Ren as they walk over the bridge overlooking the training ground. She knows for a thing that Hux, with her wiry thin frame and starved, incorporeal intellectual pursuits, cares very little for such practical notions like physical training. The look on her face as she stops, her high heels making a sharp clicking sound and her gloved hands brushing against the railing, give to her whole being a predatory quality. Her neck stretches out of the sharp collar of her uniform as she leans forward, a lone, tiny strand of hair escaping from the crisp confines of her intricate braided hair.

 

She almost, almost lets out a smile.

 

“It seems like Lady Ren has found a new pastime”, she says casually enough, changing the topic from the technical babble about the construction of the new base they’d been discussing previously. “I heard her latest failure in training with the Supreme Leader has made her especially keen on combat training.”

 

There’s a muffled hiss of pain as Ren’s current opponent falls on the ground. He’s dragged away from her by one of his comrades quickly. Ren commands, with her unchanged, monotone cybernetic voice, “Next.”.

 

“Yes,” Phasma states, and she can’t help but to add. “It seems like her training techniques have also improved the efficiency of our soldiers, far more than their regular fighting simulations.”

 

It’s not news that they disagree on that topic, but it’s been a sore spot ever since Hux unveiled her grand scheme for the next large scale operations of the Order, Phasma keenly aware that her troops aren’t as well prepared for it as Hux would like to believe. Phasma, however, hasn’t been stupid enough until now to defy Hux directly, knowing how skilled she is at getting rid of political rivals who don’t benefit from Kylo Ren’s special status to the Supreme Leader.

 

She can feel the general tense at the hidden barb from the visor of her helmet, but she knows she won’t crush her like Kylo Ren is currently crushing stormtroopers in a fit of rage. Hux can do the math and realise that Phasma is more useful on her side than against her, or so Phasma believes.

 

She leans against the railing, her silhouette as angular and dangerous as barbed wire. Her eyes follow the fighting going on below, and suddenly something sparks inside of them as if her formidable brain of her has completed another tactical puzzle.

 

“I’m sure there’s a way to integrate this into soldiers’ training in a more regulated way. I’d hate to rely on Lady Ren’s highly unstable fancy to train my army.”

 

There’s another muffled sound of a trooper being defeated, as if to punctuate Hux’s speech. The general, however, isn’t looking at Ren anymore. She’s observing Phasma with a keen look on her eyes, her bony arms hidden under the heavy leather of her long coat, crossed over her meager chest.

 

“But now that you mention it… I do wonder if it’s possible to expand the good results we’ve had with the privates’ training with Ren to field officers. How about we try a little experiment, you and I, Captain?”

 

.

 

Phasma doesn’t usually train with the recruits on the lower deck gymnasiums. She believes in strict hierarchy within armed forces, and even though she tolerates a less strict conduct from her colleagues, she keeps her own professionalism towards her underlings at all times. It’s no great wonder that her presence here, along with General Hux’s, causes quite a commotion as they both approach the fighting ring.

 

The only one who seems unphased by their arrival is Ren herself. She’s currently inflicting a rough beating to a stormtrooper who presented a tad bit more resistance to her blows than she would have liked. Hux waits politely for her to be done to step in, a quiet look on her face that can only hide sharp, pearly white teeth.

 

“Ren,” she says as she walks towards her. Hux never uses her title in front of her, Phasma guesses out of spite.

“General Hux,” Ren answers, and there’s a hint of her breath being strained from the exercise through her voice transmitter.

“May I suggest a new opponent for you?”

 

There’s a bite to her tone. She knows Phasma doesn’t want to be here, doesn’t want to get into a very tricky situation with a fighter she knows will crush her. She also knows Phasma won’t contradict herself, or give anyone, even Ren, an easy victory out of pride.

 

Ren doesn’t answer right away. She looks over Phasma, and her gaze is burning even through her black mask. Phasma knows she can’t win against Ren, but she knows that she can’t lose, or defile herself from the fight now too. She smiles sourly, hidden under her chrome helmet, at Hux’s devious way with words and people. This is her punishment for speaking out of line, and a reminder that Hux, with her emaciated ninety pounds frame, always deals with insubordination swiftly.

 

The General is triumphant, and she brushes iddly the shoulder of Phasma’s armour as Ren nods in agreement. She's sure, for a fraction of an instant, that she can see the knight tense, very briefly, before assuming once more a fighting stance.

 

It’s at that moment that it dawns upon Phasma that she's but a pawn in the unsaid war raging between Ren and Hux. She also realises that there isn’t anything she can do about it, and that she’s strangely as peace with being a weapon hurled between the two women. This is a dangerous place to be, and if there’s anything conditioning has done to Phasma’s mind, it’s making her crave danger.

 

Kylo Ren fights like she commands, with a flurry of showy moves to assert dominance and powerful, reckless emotion in her every moves, rage, wrath and pain. She’s beautiful in her technique and surprisingly fast given her bulky stature and impressive height. She wields the practice staff like a sword, unlike the common use of riot control baton common with stormtroopers, and it gives her more reach even though it makes her aim less accurate. She’s more focused than one would have imagined, and it turns to be a strength that gives her a clear advantage over Phasma who’s used to fight significantly smaller soldiers in training.

 

The captain finds herself quickly struggling to parry Ren’s blows as the knight grows frustrated with the fact that Phasma, and by proxy, Hux, won’t let her petulantly have her win. Ren’s lunging blow misses its target, but it inflicts a hit to Phasma’s shoulder as the exact same spot Hux touched right before the fight. Maybe it’s not a miss after all because there’s something that’s almost like self-satisfaction emanating from Ren’s entire being. Once again, it’s about Hux, as everything ever is.

 

The general is observing the fight from a distance as she always does. There’s a shine of interest in her sharp blue irises that hides being her stony, unchanged haughty expression. Phasma catches a passing look at her as Ren prepares to charge once more, and she can see Hux smirk.

 

Something changes in the knight’s fighting style, an odd sort of renewed rage and desperation in the way she wields her weapon, her grip tense on the metal edge of the stick. Phasma finds herself stepping back, struggling to keep up. Soon enough, she has to avoid a lunging thrust that would have easily sent a rookie in the med bay for several weeks. 

 

Phasma knows that she’ll have to change strategy if she’s to win against Ren. She changes techniques, copying Ren’s hold on the practice stick, closing the gap in fighting range that separated them. Ren takes notice of it, and the surprise seems to make her anger suddenly deflate as she has to avoid a heavy strike coming from Phasma. It’s,however, the manoeuvre that follows that sends her reeling on the floor under the eyes of the entire company.

 

Phasma doesn’t have the time to reflect on her momentary victory and subsequently exhausted body. There’s an invisible pressure gripping her throat, forcing her upwards, and Ren is slowly standing up once more with her outstretched hand in her direction. Phasma knows what is happening, what always happen in that kind of situation. She knows better, however, than to fear death, and yet she struggles like a drowning man, helplessly flailing in the air as she pointlessly tries to pry away Ren’s grip manually. The pressure on her windpipe makes her face feel numb, her vision blurry, and she can’t hear anything beyond the shaky rhythm of her panicked heartbeat.

 

She’s about to lose conscience when she’s released, leaving her to fall boneless on the ground. The impact makes her helmet roll away from her head, but she’s far too busy gasping into freedom to care just yet.

 

When she does rase her eyes away from the ground, she’s greeted by the sight of Hux holding Ren’s gloved palm in her own, caressing it in a soothing, almost motherly motion. It’s always a striking image to see them standing next to one another, Ren’s towering figure next to Hux’s scrawny body. It’s because no matter how physically imposing Kylo Ren looks, there’s always something in Hux’s demeanour that seems to command a more reverent for of respect. As Ren stays motionless under her touch, Phasma can’t help but to be reminded of the large snakes on Dagoba softly ensnaring jungle tigers in a lethal embrace.

 

The entire room, although packed with a growing mass of onlookers ever since Ren started her half-controlled rampage, is mute, and the only sound remaining is the still strained sound of Phasma’s breathing. It’s, unsurprisingly enough, the general who finally breaks the silence, letting go of Ren as she addresses her soldiers with a firm voice. Her posh Core World accent takes a sharper twist when she instructs and lead, bending wills into submission.

 

“I hope you’ve enjoyed the first demonstration of what your new simulation training program will look like. Given the recent events, our efforts need to be doubled to ensure the First Order’s victory against the Resistance. I expect of you to give your best in the following weeks as our new base is under construction and the Supreme Leader gathers our allies for one grand assault against the New Republic. Long live the Great Leader!”

“Long live the Great Leader!” the soldiers echoe.

 

Hux walks out of the training area like an empress would, her long coat trailing behind her as Ren follows her steps without even giving Phasma a passing look of apology. It’s not surprising, or even remotely out of place for Ren to do this, but Phasma can’t help but to feel that burning pull of anger in her chest. Conditioning should have taken care of her personnal feelings, but it hasn’t.

 

The room slowly but surely empties itself, and she grabs her fallen helmet as she rises herself back up. The chrome plated material presents her with her own reflection as she inspects it for scratches, the cropped blond hair, the sharp eyebrows, the defined cheekbones. Her split lip has a coppery taste from being thrown on the ground half-conscious and she knows she’ll sport a rather heavy bruise on her shoulder for the next couple of weeks. Still, she smiles, blood staining her teeth, knowing no one will dare to pay any visible attention to her. The stormtroopers are far too terrified to be sent to reconditioning for angering the captain caught in a brief moment of weakness.

 

The reassuring weight of the carbon mask falls over her shoulders once more. She rises up, and leaves, knowing very well that the whisper that will follow her retreat into her private quarters. She doesn’t care, or at least tries to look like it, just like she doesn’t care about being a pawn in Hux’s little games for reasons she isn’t sure she wants to admit to herself.

 

*


	2. Love Bites

A few days later, Phasma dreams of gripping Hux’s carefully braided hair and bending her into submission as she screams, begging her stop. Her voice grows hoarse as her fingers pound into her, breaking into tears at some point. She’s more beautiful than Phasma has ever seen her. 

 

It’s one of those vivid, violent erotic dreams that Phasma knows are a side effect of conditioning. Many officers, along with recruits, have complained about it in the past, but not Phasma. They’re not strictly speaking unpleasant for her, albeit a little bit more disruptive than she would care to admit. These dreams have been a regular occurrence in the past few months or so, but her defeat against Ren seem to have exacerbated them, along with making Hux the sole subject of these nocturnal fantasies.

 

She’s not sure as to how to feel about it as when she wakes up in sweat, her breath shaky from the adrenaline. All she knows is that she hasn’t seen Ren at all ever since their fight. Hux sports that self-satisfied smug expression whenever she addresses Phasma now, her dark painted lips curling obscenely around the knight’s name whenever she talks about her.

 

_ “Lady Ren has been spending more time meditating, Captain. I fear that’s the reason why we haven’t heard a lot from her lately.” _

 

Phasma stretches herself out of bed even though she knows her shift isn’t starting before a few more hours. Her whole body feels restless. And her throat is parched, from screaming in her sleep maybe. She doesn’t even bother getting dressed, only clad in her briefs as she heads for the common bathroom officers share in the higher level dormitories. It’s usually empty at this time, and perfect for her to have a long, scorching shower.

 

The ceramic tiles feel cold under her naked feet, and the hot water burns her still healing bruises. She sighs, rests her head against the wall as the shower head emits a constant stream against her skin. For the first time in years, without really knowing why, Phasma lets herself feel exhausted in her very bones.

 

There’s a short fraction of an instant, one that’s barely traceable thanks to training and conditioning, when she misses, maybe, whatever home she might have had.

 

It doesn’t last because before she realises what’s happening, there’s a gloved hand gripping her by the back of the neck and dragging her out of the stall. It all happens too fast. Her head is knocked against the wall hard enough to make her lose balance. Her vision blurs as she falls to her knees on the bathroom floor. Still she knows, even before a word is uttered, who exactly is paying her a surprise visit.

 

“Have you ever had her?” Kylo Ren’s cybernetic voice asks.

 

Phasma can only look up to her tall, masked figure, incredulous. She feels cold and naked and angry, all of a sudden, but there’s no fear. With her eyes closed, she sighs.

 

“I imagine you’re referring to General Hux…”

 

Ren isn’t patient, has never been. Maybe that’s the reason why Hux can toy with her so easily. There’s the sound of a saber being activated over her. Phasma can feel the warmth of the fractured, unstable crystal light ray buzzing next to her throat. Even hidden behind her mask and her careful hold of the sword, Ren’s whole being reads like an open book.

 

Even though she tries her best to look tall and terrible, there’s something ridiculous about her petulant jealous rage. She’s not nearly as smart as she’d like to think. Unlike Phasma, she hasn’t realised yet that Hux is playing the both of them like a game of chess, with all the virtuosity of the grand master she is.

 

“Answer the question,” she commands, her vocoder buzzing from what Phasma guesses is screaming.

 

She can’t help but to smirk at the irony of the situation. That earns her a burn, quick and more startling than really painful, from the sword, right under the line of her jaw. The sound of her own sizzling flesh makes her flinch, but it doesn’t last. Kylo Ren looks down at her, her grip tight on the handle as she withdraws the laser blade.

 

“Answer the question,” she repeats, more quietly this time. “Or I’ll just go through your mind to get the answer I need.”

 

Phasma holds Ren’s gaze as he hand goes over the fresh burn on her throat. She wonders very briefly is Ren enjoys breaking people in a sexual way, from the manner with which her whole body is taut as a string. Phasma isn’t sure if she really wants to know.

 

“The General doesn’t fuck people if it doesn’t contribute to her career advancement.”

 

_ You, of all people, should know. _

 

It’s not the answer Ren wants but there’s hardly anything she can do against the truth. She stays still for a moment, her gaze on Phasma’s naked form beneath her, but it’s hard to tell if her mind is there or elsewhere. It doesn’t matter because before before Phasma has the time to place another word, Ren storms out of the bathroom, leaving the captain alone.

 

The shower head hasn’t been turned off in the struggle and Phasma has no will to get up and close it just yet. The water makes that quiet splashing sound on the linoleum tiles as she passes a few careful fingers over the impact bruise on the side of her head. It’s nothing too serious, she diagnoses quickly, but she’s not stupid enough to disregard protocol and not report to med bay later today.

 

It’s also at that moment that she realises her whole body feels restless in a very sexual way, from the night’s dreams of Hux or from the violent encounter with Ren, Phasma can’t know. She looks at her bloodied fingers for a moment, shakes her head, gets up opting for a cold shower.

  
  


It doesn’t come as a surprise to know she’s being summoned to appear in General Hux’s office on that day. It’s not the first time Phasma comes here, but every time she never fails to be impressed by its barren, sleek appearance. The General’s desk thrones in front of the large bay window, all black panes and sharp angles, mirroring its owner’s uniformed silhouette. The vastness of space is what motivates Hux to work, relentlessly, to the fulfilment of her grand plan for the galaxy.

 

Hux plays her cards expertly, be it with people or weapons of mass destruction. She’s busy faking to review construction plans for the new base when Phasma comes in. The general looks up and, in an uncharacteristic way that is bone-chilling in hindsight, smiles.

 

“Hello, Captain,” she says nonchalantly, her voice as sweet and lethal as the perfume of a carnivorous flower.

 

Phasma salutes, knowing that what Hux wants out of her, she gets, one way or another.

 

“You asked to see me.”

“I did,” her smile doesn’t falter. “Please, sit down, and take off your helmet. It’s just the two of us, no need to be so formal.”

 

She obeys, placing the chrome helmet on the general’s desk, her hair in its usual carefully gelled state. As she faces Hux without her mask to protect herself, Hux rises up, circling the desk to look at her more closely. She leans over her, inquisitive eyes made sharper by her emaciated features. Hux’s gloved hand caresses Phasma’s chrome plated shoulder, her hair, her cheek. 

 

“I’ve seen you and Lady Ren have had some time to talk.”

 

The ship’s cameras do not lie. Phasma stays silent as Hux comes closer, her wiry body somehow more imposing than Kylo Ren could ever wish to be. She lets her gaze fall upon Phasma’s face with an almost motherly look of indulgence. It’s a possessive touch that fleets over her next, and Hux’s voice has this sharp cutting quality as her pale finger traces the lightsaber scarred tissue on her throat.

 

“Almost like a lover’s mark,” she whispers, before bending over to kiss it.

 

Her teeth graze the flesh wound and Phasma shivers as if she’s being injected with venom.

 

She knows she wants Hux the same way Ren wants her, in a confused, hazy lust she can’t put into proper words. Hux knows Phasma isn’t like Ren, that Phasma knows exactly what kind of game the general is playing with the both of them. Her calm, even breath brushes against her throat as she trails her fingers down the collar of her chrome armour. Phasma can feel her smile, sharp jaw flush to her skin, ready to bite.

 

“She’s beautiful when she gets upset, isn’t she?” Hux chuckles lightly.

 

Phasma stays silent, and it’s all the answer Hux needs. She kisses the scar again, before using her teeth to take off her right glove in one smooth motion. The gesture feels crass given Hux’s upbringing and usual behaviour, and Phasma can’t stop her eyes from slipping over her elongated, dainty hands, the pale skin, the carefully clipped short nails. It looks out of place over the reflexive chrome material of her breastplate, like a knife ready to tear inside.

 

“You’re playing with fire,” Phasma states as Hux dips her hand lower, over the armour piece covering Phasma’s crotch.

“I know.”

 

It doesn’t take much ordering from the General to have Phasma bend over her will. She goes to her knees under her guiding touch, lifting up her pencil skirt and pulling aside her black panties to kiss her shaven sex. Her smell is heavy, musky, and Phasma lets herself dive into it without a thought for the rest.

 

Hux giggles in delight as she eats her out in earnest, sucking on her clit when she commands her to between gasps of pleasure. Her feather light scrawny legs come to wrap themselves around Phasma’s neck, keeping her close. This isn’t like Phasma’s dreams of violent domination, not with Hux pressing her face in as she rides her tongue from her sitting position on her baren desk. 

 

The memory of past fantasies brings the vivid souvenir of Ren choking her into submission, and Phasma can feel herself ache for more against the synthetic fabric of her under armour suit. She knows that the knight is probably watching them at this very moment through what she imagines is some sort of magic force trick, if not the ship’s surveillance system. That fact excites her more than it scares her. While Ren is steel covering velvet, Hux is velvet covering steel, and there is no way to win against one or the other aboard this vessel.

 

Hux comes with a deep shiver of her entire lithe body, clutching Phasma’s short hair. The captain lets the general ride the last waves of pleasure leisurely on the flat of her tongue, her taste sharped in her mouth. Then, Hux loosens the grip of her legs over Phasma’s shoulders, straighten herself up and gestures for cigarettes in one of the drawers of her desk. They’re one of those expensive Corellian brands, specially imported for her personal consumption, and she slips one between her lips in a move that Phasma can’t decide is deliberately or indeliberately indecent.

 

Phasma flicks open the gold plated lighter for Hux, watches the smoke curl against Hux’s lips, hear her moan softly with a self-satisfied look on her face.

  
General Hux sends her away still painfully aroused,  _ the bitch _ , and Phasma masturbates furiously once she’s alone in her personal quarters, climaxing within a full minute after she’s taken out her armour. She collapses naked against the wall she’s been leaning on, her legs shaking, letting out a grunt of both arousal and bruised pride. She knows Hux, and her machinations, probably watching this at this very moment with a smile and a cigarette in her dainty hand. She doesn’t care anymore of what that makes her. She’s too angry to think about anything else than the fading glow of orgasm, and Kylo Ren.


	3. Star Destroyers

The new base’s construction is completed within a month, once again a demonstration of General Hux’s powerful organisation and planning skills. She looks at her creation from the commanding deck of the Finalizer with a self-satisfied look on her face, and Phasma briefly wonders if this is as much about ensuring victory for the First Order as it is about giving the middle finger to an absent father figure. She can’t know.

They’ve been having sex on a semi-regular basis for some time, now, but Hux is, as always, in control of her Captain and of herself. She doesn’t let personal details slip under any circumstances, at least not indeliberately. It’s only rational, because the General knows Phasma isn’t above using any weapons to get what she wants. They’re of the same breed, and they tell this to each other silently, with gestures and look, the pressure of flesh against flesh and the ache of want that precedes release.

Hux has given one of those rousing speeches to the troops before coming here as the ship approaches the base, putting all her heart, if she had any, into every word, into every trembling shout to arms.

“We’re standing over the abyss of history,” she’d said, the learned scholar she was. “Nothing, now, may stand on our way.”

Phasma doesn’t know about history, or about the philosophical implications of a man-made weapon able to wipe out entire star systems within minutes. All she knows is the power of the soldier she leads, of her own body, and maybe, maybe some shattered glass pieces of her previous life, before the Order, and before conditioning made her the person she now is.

There’s something inside her chest that makes her want to launch herself forward and hold Hux while she twirls into insanity on that bridge, a glint of mégalomania to her eyes she usually keeps carefully hidden behind a pressed uniform and tightly braided hair. The moment passes before she can catch it, slipping between her tensed fingers as the destroyer makes its approach towards the planet.

Then, Kylo Ren makes her entrance. She’s been absent ever since her and Phasma’s encounter in the showers, presumably to train with the Great Leader on some faraway planet of the Uncharted Territories, or so Hux said. Phasma knows better than to believe anything that comes out of the general’s mouth, but she’s not stupid enough to ask questions either.

Ren’s presence is as pompous and self-important as the knight herself, large boots clanking on metal, heavy robes brushing the ground in their wake. She passes Phasma before even looking at her, heading towards Hux with a burning wrath radiating from er every pores. She extends her gloved hand and the few officers blocking her way are abruptly pushed aside until she has a clear view of her target.

There’s a soft whimper that escapes Hux’s parted lips as she’s violently pressed against the console she’s been previously leaning over. No one dares to move as Ren closes the space separating them with one final step, gripping the general by her delicate neck as she forces her to meet her masked face.

“The objective was to find Skywalker, not to waste time on your little war toys,” her dead metallic voice buzzes out.

Phasma wonders, for a brief instant, if this is really happening, if Ren is going to kill Hux just like that, on brash moment of anger.

It’s not about the base, nor about Hux’s military efficiency. It’s about Ren’s burning mess of primal pulsions and need to possess, and lust roaring in her chest. Hux has played her like she’s playing Phasma, and it dawns upon the captain that Ren’shold on the sickly thin general is a lover’s hold. It can’t bring itself to strike, if not to kill.

Hux seems to melt into the knight’s grip in a way she’s never done in Phasma’s own. She can’t, and probably never will, know if her gestures are real or affected. Hux smiles an earnest, uncharacteristic smile, her hand going up to caress the side of Ren’s mask slowly, carefully. The gesture seems to quiet Ren into letting her go, little by little, and Hux’s feet are on the ground once more. It gives her a window of time to straighten herself up, her hair still somewhat shaken by the incident. Phasma, and the entire corps of officers present, can only watch.

Hux rises herself to the tip of her toes to whisper something next to Ren’s helmet, her painted lips almost brushing against the black steel in an obscene way. The whole bridge is still plunged into petrified silence, but it’s impossible to make out what she’s saying. All Phasma can be sure of is that she is mesmerised by the way Hux gently passes her hand over Ren’s shoulder, and how Ren bends in barely hidden delight under her featherlight touch.

“Captain Phasma,” Hux calls, suddenly dragging her back into her body. “Could you please lead the officers on bridge to the pod prepared for my own landing? There’s been a change of plans, me and Lady Ren will stay on deck until further orders are issued.”

Phasma watches her, really does, with all her soul, for a second that feels like an eternity. Hux is still insane, and still going to come crashing down sooner or later, but Hux doesn’t care because moments like this make it all worth it, all of it. 

Phasma obeys with a silent nod even though she wants nothing more than to scream in abject rage. She’s good at it, following orders, but as she leaves the bridge last, save from Hux and Ren, she can’t help but to steal a look at them right before the sliding doors close shut.

Time stops, all of a sudden. Hux, still dangerously close to Ren, is taking off the knight’s helmet with the tips of her dainty fingers, revealing the face hiding underneath. It’s striking face, not at all like the monster most First Order privates and officers imagine lurk behind the mask, pale, angular, irregular without being ugly. The puckered flesh of the scar that slices Ren’s features in half contrasts against her milky white skin. 

Somehow it’s the raw humanity of Kylo Ren’s face that’s more terrifying than whatever Phasma could ever imagine. Their eyes meet, and Phasma can’t decide if she’s won or if she’s lost. 

The bridge’s automatic door closes, destroying the moment forever. Outside, weapons of mass destruction are being built, armies are being trained and wars are being waged for control of the galaxy on a scale pawns like Kylo Ren and Phasma can hardly understand.

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written slightly differently with a male Phasma, but then I went to a roller derby tournament and decided I liked girls fighting girls better than just boys getting their asses kicked.


End file.
